Against the Tide, Chapter 14: Mulop

Last time on Against the Tide, our Protagonists finally reached Mulop’s lair! What will the Godlike Octopus do to them? Find out after the cut.

The octopus regarded them for a long moment, during which Conor found himself completely unable to speak. Mulop’s bulbous dark orange head nearly touched the rocks overhead, and yet there was obviously a lot more of him still hidden underwater. He looked like a giant brain on top of a pair of eyes on top of a web of tentacles, and that was it. His expression was completely unreadable. Angry? Bemused? Delighted? Half asleep? Conor had no idea.

Luckily for our Protagonists, Mulop is a friendly Godlike Octopus who likes to grope visitors with his tentacles and talk about how small his visitors are. Once he’s done with that, though, Mulop gives them an Epic Infodump:

What’s up with Gerathon?
In case you forgot, Gerathon has been freed from her prison, and she controls anyone who drank the Bile. This is news to our Protagonists.

Who the hell is Feliandor?
Remember the Trippy Flashback Sequence that Rollan had on Nightshade Island? Feliandor was the boy king of Stetriol who drank the Bile. This allowed Gerathon to possess him and start the first global war … just as Kovo planned.

Wait … the global war was Kovo’s idea? Who saw that coming?
Apparently not Mulop and Briggan. For prescient Godlike Animals, they suck at predicting the future.

Why did Kovo start a global war?
So he could take over the world, duh. Of course, Mulop thinks that’s a stupid idea, because what does one do after conquering everything? But whatever, Kovo planned on using the bond between humans and spirit animals (which is a secret guarded by the Great Beasts) to become king of the world.

Isn’t Kovo still imprisoned?
Oh, he is, but he’ll be freed soon. And you need McGuffins talismans to do that. Again, this is news to our heroes.

Mulop is a nice Godlike Octopus: he’s gonna give his talisman to the Protagonists so they can save the world! What a buddy. Conor, the Designated Leader, takes it … but first he has to complete a minor sidequest.

Nooooooo. I thought we were done with these already.

Thankfully, this is a short sidequest: Conor just has to use the Coral Octopus to swim out of the grotto through a small hole. It’s basically a tutorial for using the Coral Octopus’s abilities of breathing underwater (via liquid breathing) and squeezing through tight spaces.

So while the rest of the party climbs out of the grotto, Conor takes the Coral Octopus out on a little test dive. He quickly completes the tutorial sidequest and surfaces … just in time to see the Conquerors arriving at Mulop’s island! But wait — how did they find the place?

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Stuff I Forgot to Mention Above:
We’ll learn a lot more about Feliandor in Tales of the Great Beasts.

Wondering where all those other talismans are? The player character in the Spirit Animals game finds them.

The locations of Ninani’s and Gerathon’s talismans are revealed in “Ninani’s Nectar” and The Book of Shane. I decided to spoil their whereabouts now because I’m nice like that.

Argh I had to go to the wiki to get the names of all the other talismans. You won’t find out what they do until later in the series.

See that song I linked to above in the talisman checklist? I’m gonna be spamming it in my recap of Rise and Fall. So you’d better get used to it.

It’s nice seeing a talisman that has abilities related to its patron animal. Breathing underwater and “squishiness” make sense for an octopus-themed McGuffin.

Mulop knows that something is up with Jhi. Yes, this is related to that EPIC SPOILER we accidentally revealed in the comments earlier.